Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. I.djvu/248

264 Switzerland was up to defend herself and her own against Prussia. All differences, all contentions, whether small or great, were now forgotten, between the Swiss Cantons. They rose up like one family, like one man, for the defense of the common fatherland. The forest Cantons, as well as the Pays de Vaud, and Geneva, Zürich, and Freyburg, the isolated Granbundten, the Italian-speaking Tessin, each emulated the others in sending men and means for the same object; all armed themselves for the Sworn-Confederacy; and not they alone. The same spirit moved in the Swiss out of Switzerland. The electric-telegraphs worked day and night, bringing messages from the Swiss in Turin, Milan, Vienna, Paris, London; from wealthy bankers, who forwarded large sums of money for the expenses of the war; from young artisans, who were ready to leave their workshops, and place themselves under the banners of their native land. Nor were even young men of affluence behind them.

“My mother is herself packing my knapsack at this moment, and I hasten to join the army,” wrote a wealthy young man from Vienna.

The enthusiasm was universal; it would even have seized upon me, if I had really believed that war would take place. But, I do not know how it was, I did not believe it, even when I saw mothers and wives weeping in the square, La Riporne, and taking leave of their sons and husbands, who were setting out to the camp; and from the moment when I knew that the Federal government had applied to the Emperor of France, requesting his mediation, I felt